Night World : The Chosen Chapter 9

How long since hed blank with humans?That had all stopped the day he stopped organism human himself. Not at the moment hed stopped beinghuman, though. At depression all his anger had been for hunting watch Redfern.Waking up from the inanimate was an experience you dont for shell. For Quinn, it happened in the Redferncabin on a husk mattress in front of the fire.He opened his look to see three fine-looking girls leaning everyplace him. Garnet, with her wine-colored hairshining in the scarlet light, Lily with her black hair and her eyes bid topaz, and fall, his own Dove, dark-brown-haired and gentle, with ardent love in her face.That was when Hunter informed him that hed been dead for three days.I told your nonplus youd g maven to Plymouth dont tell him some otherwise. And dont try to move yet youre excessively weak. Well bring in something soon and you can feed. He stood behind his daughters, his fortification or so them, all of them looking checkmate at Quinn. Be happ y. Youre one of us cleans bulletiner. except all Quinn matt-up was horror-and pain. When he put his thumbs to his teeth, he found the source of thepain. His canine teeth were as long as a ragingcats and they throbbed at the slightest touch.He was a monster. An unholy creature who undeniable blood to survive. Hunter Redfern had been tellingthe truth about his family, and hed changed Quinn into one of them. amok with fury, Quinn jumped up and tried to get his hands around Hunters throat.And Hunter upright laughed, fending off the attack easily. The next thing Quinn knew, he was running downthe blazed trail in the forest, heading for his produces house. Staggering and stumbling down the trail,rather. He was nigh too weak to walk.Then suddenly Dove was beside him. Little Dove who looked as if she couldnt outrun a flower. Shesteadied him, held him up, and tried to convince him to go defend. tho Quinn could tho come back of one thing acquire to his come. His father was a mini ster his father would receipt what to do. His father would help.And Dove, at last, agree to go with him.Later Quinn would realize that of course he should gift know better.They reached Quinns home. At that point, if Quinn was afraid of everything, it was that his father wouldntbelieve this wild story of bloodthirst and death. But one look at Quinns new teeth convinced his father of everything.He could recognize a d malevolent when he saw one, he said.And he knew his duty. Like every Puritans, it was to cast out sin and evil wherever he found it.With that, his father picked up a strike out from the fire-a good piece of seasoned pine-and then grabbedDove by the hair.It was around this time that the screaming started, the screaming Quinn would be able to hear invariablyafter if he listened. Dove was too gentle to put up much of a fight. And Quinn himself was too weak tosave her.He tried. He threw himself on top of Dove to shield her from the stake. He would al authoritys down the s caron his side to prove it. But the wood that nicked him perforate Dove to the heart. She died looking up athim, the light in her brown eyes going out.Then everything was confusion, with his father chasing him, crying, brandishing the bloody stake pulledfrom Doves body. It terminate when Hunter Red-fern appeared at the door with Lily and Garnet. Theytook Quinn and Dove home with them, while Quinns father went running to the neighbors for help. Heprecious help burning the Redfern cabin down.That was when Hunter said it, the thing that severed Quinns ties with his old world. He looked down athis dead daughter and said, She was too gentle to live in a world full of humans. Do you think you cando any better?And Quinn, dazed and starving, so frightened and full of horror that he couldnt talk, decided then that hewould. Humans were the enemy. No matter what he did, they would never accept him. He had becomesomething they could only hate-so he business leader as well become it thoroughl y.You see, you dont have a family anymore, Hunter mused. Unless its the Redferns.Since then, Quinn had pattern of himself only as a lamia.He shook his head, feeling clearer than he had for days.The girl had disturbed him. The girl in the cellar, the girl whose face he had never seen. For two daysafter that night, all he could think of was somehow finding her.What had happened between them well, he still didnt understand that. If she had been a witch, hedhave persuasion she bewitched him. But she was human. And shed do him doubt everything he knewabout humans.Shed awakened feelings that had been sleeping since Dove died in his arms.But now now he thought it was just as well he hadnt been able to find her. Because the cellar girlwasnt just human, she was a vampire hunter. Like his father. His father, who, wild-eyed and sobbing,had driven the stake through Doves heart.As always, Quinn matt-up himself losing his grip on sanity as he remembered it. What a compassionateness that hed have to kill the cellar girl the next time he saw her.But at that place was no help for it. Vampire hunters were worsened than the ordinary human vermin, who werejust stupid. Vampire hunters were the sin and the evil that had to be cast out. The Night World was theonly world.And I havent been to the dub in a week, Quinn thought, showing his teeth. He laughed out loud, astrange and brickle sound. Well, I guess Id better go tonight.Its all part of the immense dance, you see, he thought to the cellar girl, who of course couldnt hear him. Thedance of animation and death. The dance thats going on right this minute all over the world, in African savannasand Arctic snowfields and the bushes in Boston Common.Killing and eating. track down and dying. A spider snags a bluebottle fly a paired bear grabs a seal. Acoyote springs on a rabbit. Its the way the world has always been.Humans were part of it, too, except that they let debaclehouses do the killing for them and receivedtheir prey in the form of McDonalds hamburgers.There was an rescript to things. The dance requiredthat someone be the hunter and someone else be the hunted. With all those young girls longing to offerthemselves to the darkness, it would be cruel of Quinn non to provide a darkness to oblige them.They were all only contend their parts.Quinn headed for the floor show, laughing in a way that scared even him.The club was only a few streets forth from the warehouse, Rashel noted. frenetice sense. Everything aboutthis unconscious process had the stamp of efficiency, and she sensed Quinns hand in that.I wonder what hes acquire paid to provide the girls for sale? she thought. Shed heard that Quinn standardizeddmoney.Remember, once we get inside, you dont know me, she said to Daphne. Its safer for both of us that way. They might suspect something if they knew that prime(prenominal) you escaped and now youre turning up with astranger.Got it. Daphne looked excited and a little scared. Under her coat, she was wearing a slinky black topand a brief skirt, and her black-stockinged legs twinkled as she ran toward the club door.Under Rashels coat, hidden in the lining, was a knife. Like her sword, it was made of lignum vitae, thehardest wood on earth. The sheath had several raise secret compartments.It was the knife of a ninja, and Sensei, who had taught Rashel the martial arts, wouldnt have approvedat all. He wouldnt have approved of Rashelmade it in, too, her story must have passed inspection. That was a relief.Inside, the place looked like hell. Not a shambles. It literally looked like Hell. Hades. The Underworld.The lights turned it into a place of infernal fire and twisting purple shadows. The music was unearthly and dissonant and sounded to Rashel as if it were being played backward.She caught toss out of conversation as she walked across the floor. going out Dumpster diving later(prenominal) no money. So I gotta jack somebody told Mummy Idbe at the key-dub meeting You get a real cross branch here, she thought dryly.Everybody had one thing in commonalty, though they were young. Kids. The oldest looked about eighteen.The youngest-well, there were a few girls Rashel would put at twelve. She had an impulse to go backand insert something wooden into Ivan.A slow fire that had started in her toilet table when she first heard about the Crypt was burning hotter andhotter with everything she saw here. This entire place is a snare, a gigantic Venus flytrap, she thought asshe took off her coat and added it to a pile on the floor.But if she wanted to shut it down, she had to pose cool, stick to her plan. Standing by a cast-iron column,she scanned the room for vampires.And there, stand up with a little group that in-duded Daphne, was Quinn.It gave Rashel an odd shock to see him, and she wanted to look away. She couldnt. He was laughing,and somehow that caught hold of her like a fishhook. For a moment the morbid lighting of the roomseemed rainbow-colo red in the radiance drip by that laughter.Appalled, Rashel realized that her face had flushed and her heart was beating fast.I hate him, she thought, and this was true. She did hate him for what he was doing to her. He made herfeel unmoored and adrift. Confused. Helpless.She mute why those girls were clustered around him, longing to fling themselves into his darknesslike a bunch of virgin sacrifices jumping into a volcano. I mean, what else do you do with a guy like that?she thought.Kill him. It would be the only solution even if he werent a vampire, she decided with sudden psychopathiccheer. Because prolonged contact with that smile was obviously going to annihilate her.Rashel blinked rapidly, getting a grip on herself. All right. Concentrate on that, on the job to be done.She was going to have to kill him, but not now right now she had to get herself chosen.Walking carefully on her heels, she went over to join Quinns group.He didnt see her at first. He was set about Daphne and a couple of other girls, laughing frequently- toofrequently. He looked wild and a little feverishto Rashel. A sort of devilish Mad Hatter at an insane tea party. and I just felt so totally awful that I didnt get to meet you, Daphne was saying, and I just wish Iknew what happened, because it was just so seriously weirdShe was telling her story, Rashel realized. At least none of the people listening seemed openlysuspicious. I havent seen you here before, came a voice behind her.It belonged to a striking girl with dark hair, very pale skin, and eyes like gold or topaz or a hawks.Rashel froze, every muscle tensing, exhausting to keep her face expressionless.Another vampire.She was sure of it. The camellia-petal skin, the light in the eyes this must be the girl vampire whodbrought Daphne food in the warehouse.No, this is my first time, Rashel said, making her voice light and eager. My puddles Shelly. It wasclose enough to her own name that she would turn automatically if anyone said it.Im Lily. The girl said it without warmth, and those hawklike eyes keep to bore straight intoRashels.Rashel had to struggle to stay on her feet.Its Lily Redfern, she thought, working desperately to keep an idiot smile plastered on her face. I know itis. How many Lilys can there be whod be working with Quinn?Ive got a Redfern right here in front of me. Ive got Hunter Redferns daughter here.For an instant she was tempted to simply attain a dash for her knife. Killing a laurels like Lily seemedalmost worth giving up the enclave.But on the other hand, Hunter Redfern was a moderate sort of vampire, with a kitty of influence on theNight World Council. He helped keep other vampires in line. Striking at him through his daughter wouldjust make him mad, and then he might start listening to the Councilors who wanted to slaughter humans indroves.And Rashel would lose any hope of getting at the heart of the slave trade, where the real scum were.I hate politics, Rashel thought. But she wa s already beaming at Lily, prattling for all she was worth. Itwas my friend Marnie who told me about this place, and Im truly glad I came because its even betterthan I thought, and Ive got this poem I wrote-Really. Well, Im dying not to hear it, Lily said. Her hawklike eyes had lost interest. Her face was fillwith open contempt-shed dismissed Rashel as a hopeless fawning idiot. She walked away withoutglancing back.Two tests passed. One to go.Thats what I like about Lily. Shes just so absolutely cold, a girl beside Rashel said. She had wavybronze hair and bee-stung lips. Hi, Im Juanita, she added.And shes serious, Rashel thought as she introduced herself. Quinns group had noticed her at last, andthey all seemed to agree with Juanita. They were spellbound by Lilys cold personality, her lack of feeling.They saw it as strength. Yeah, because feeling hurts. mayhap I should worship her, too, Rashel thought. She was finding toomany things in common with these girls.Lily the ice princess, another girl murmured. Its like shes not even truly from earth at all. Its likeshes from another planet.Hold that thought, a new voice said, a crisp, laughing, slightly insane voice. The effect it had on Rashelwas remarkable. It made her back stiffen and sent tingles up her palms. It closed her throat.Okay, test fleck three, she thought, drawing on every ounce of discipline shed learned in the martialarts. Dont lose zanshin. Stay loose, stay frosty, and go with it. You can do this.She turned to meet Quinns eyes.